Now Appearing in RMP....

Reviews of Modern Physics is a quarterly journal featuring review articles and colloquia on a wide range of topics in physics. Titles and brief descriptions of the articles in the July 1996 issue are provided below.

Particle physics summary. The 1996 edition of the biennially published Review of Particle Properties appears here in summary form. The present edition marks the completion of the table of standard-model quarks, with the discovery of the top. It also includes new sections on solar neutrinos, big-bang nucleosynthesis, and the Hubble constant.

Quantum computation and Shor's factoring algorithm. Artur Ekert and Richard Jozsa explain in simple physical terms Shor's algorithm for factorization of large umbers. The use of quantum interference to perform computations has attracted great interest among computer analysts and physicists, and this algorithm provides a striking illustration of the potential power of quantum computation.

On the measurement of a weak classical force coupled to a harmonic oscillator: experimental progress. Mark F. Bocko and Roberto Onofrio discuss quantum noise as a limiting factor in measurements with macroscopic systems, such as gravitational wave detectors. They also review recent experiments that approach this fundamental limit.

Quantum noise in photonics. C. H. Henry and R. F. Kazarinov review the basic physical phenomena associated with quantum noise in photonic processes, those processes involving the generation, amplification, transmission, and detection of light. In a style bridging the gap between physics and engineering sciences, the authors outline the important role played by quantum noise in many applications.

Nuclear magnetic resonance of C60 and fulleride superconductors. Charles H. Pennington and Victor A. Stenger review the contributions of nuclear magnetic resonance to our understanding of fullerite and fullerides, the materials made from C60 molecules. Magnetic resonance reveals unusual structural properties as well as providing insight into the mechanism for superconductivity.

Magnetic relaxation in high-temperature superconductors. Y. Yeshurun, Alexis P. Malozemoff, and A. Shaulov review the phenomenon of magnetic relaxation in high-TC materials, which prevented realization of the early expectations for superconductivity at liquid-nitrogen temperatures. The leakage of magnetic flux from these materials has become a widely studied phenomenon in its own right, which the authors examine with emphasis on the empirical evidence.

RMP Colloquium:The 18 arbitrary parameters of the standard model in your everyday life. Robert Cahn explores the many ways in which the 18 parameters of the standard model affect the world as we know it. While these parameters are in a sense arbitrary, slight changes in their values would drastically alter the properties of our universe.

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